Northward Prison population has risen to 227 inmates

Her Majesty Northward prison is overcrowded with inmates, and interim Prisons director Steven Barrett says he’s working with the government to try and figure out the best way forward. Yesterday (6 August) Mr. Barrett told Cayman 27 there were 227 prisoners at Northward, well over the maximum capacity of 213. In fact, according to numbers supplied by the Economics and Statistics Office, Northward Prison has been battling a growing population for several years now. The average daily population in 2011 was 207 inmates, that dropped for a few years, but rose to 204 in each of the last two years and the average daily prison population at Fairbanks prison was 13.

Going forward Mr. Barrett said the prison system has money in its budget to work with outside entities and plot the best way forward, although he admits no one knows what that may be right now.

“We are in a part of our seven stage project called the pre-development phase and all that is, that’s not a commitment to say that you are getting or we will have a new prison that’s a commitment to say we gonna have a chat about it and we’re gonna finance you to develop a business case that will set out the argument for whether or not we need one,” he said.

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